


recovery

by nedra



Category: RWBY
Genre: F/F, eyepatch!ruby, ive had this on my phone for months, no crits please this is for leisure
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-17 22:15:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21550636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nedra/pseuds/nedra
Summary: canon divergent. ruby loses an eye after a brutal 2 on 2 fight of cinder/neo vs. ruby/weiss. self-indulgent angst and fluff. an introspection on their relationship.
Relationships: Ruby Rose/Weiss Schnee
Comments: 24
Kudos: 201





	1. why r u running?? WHY R U RUNNING????

**Author's Note:**

> this first chapter is short bc I'm mostly gauging ppls interest in the story. i have more written but i'll leave it at this for now. thank u. (also sorry for errors im illiterate)

The percolator hisses behind her as she leans against the kitchen counter, sighing as she realizes that yet again she had made too much coffee- a habit developed in the weeks spent traveling with her team and the others. But now, it's just coffee for one. The others are probably halfway to Vacuo by now, minus Weiss, and her partner, who has been unconscious for coming up on the third day. 

Her gaze comes to rest on the steam rising from her mug, watching it dissipate into nothing. She hasn't touched it yet, still grappling with the pit of unease in her stomach. 

Stress and sleeplessness plagues her, marked by dark circles under her eyes and the slight tremor in her hands. Nights are spent staring at the metallic gray ceiling, or at her scroll, hoping for messages from her teammates that never come. That, and checking on Ruby every 2 hours, not finding her any less unconscious than before. 

Losing an eye is one thing, but her aura was completely depleted. Cinder truly gave Ruby the fight of her life. Wore her down to nothing. Weiss didn't fare much better, either. Neo showed just how much of a skill gap there was between them. It would be laughable if it didn't end so terribly. 

Weiss tries to avoid thinking about what happened too much. It's painful and raw, but no matter how much she may try to will it away, Ruby's guttural screams from then are forever seared into her memory, resurfacing in the darkest hours of night. Visions of Ruby collapsed onto the bloodied snow, whimpering at nothing and everything, writhing pitiful and small beneath the triumphant sneer of the usurper Fall Maiden.

It takes all of Weiss' strength not to fall into despair. To not curl herself away and blame herself endlessly for what happened. To curse at herself for where they are now.

Because it really was all her fault. 

It was, but she doesn't have the time nor the strength to confront her grief and shame. Right now, she has to stay vigilant. All her efforts must be directed towards Ruby's recovery, however long that may take. Weiss can hold off on the self-pity until then. 

But it's within the confines of this modest, abandoned vacation home in the Atlesian outskirts, where her only company is her thoughts-- that they will spend their time. Hardly ideal, but at least it's safe. Though the lack of distractions and diversions make it difficult not to lose herself in the depths of despair.

The silence is abruptly shattered by the sound of a door being thrown open with such force that it slams against the wall adjacent. Weiss is jolted from her reverie, instinctively grabbing the Myrtenaster from the table beside her and spinning around, holding it at the ready to confront the disturbance. 

She finds her partner in the bedroom doorway, her one eye wide open and panicked, a look that Weiss compares to that of a cornered, wounded animal.

Neither of them moves or says anything. Weiss observes the younger girl closer, noting the thin sheen of sweat clinging to her skin, the paranoid crease in her brow and the familliar trembling in her limbs. 

Her single silver eye comes to a stop at Weiss' weapon, which the ex-heiress immediately lowers, having forgotten that she had it raised and directed at her partner. 

In a frantic, yet athletic display of flight, Ruby vaults over the small dining room table and to the sliding glass doors at the other side of the living room, quickly undoing the latch and darting out into the backyard, leaving the depressingly gray curtains swaying in the updraft.

Weiss doesn't have the luxury of time to be confused or shocked. She quickly throws on her boots, and heads out the door after her partner. It's cold, and Ruby only has her underclothes, a red pair of skin-tight shorts and a sienna tanktop. And she's barefoot. Frostbite is the primary concern. 

Fortunately, the footprints in the snow afford her a way to track. The prints go straight into the woods, and Weiss follows them, determined.

As to what made Ruby run off, she can only guess. Waking up in a foreign environment. Being out for several days. Memories of Cinder. Her final moments of consciousness being nothing but a shivering, bloody mess. Her vision permanently impaired. All of the above.

The snow is hardened, yet brittle from days of fluctuating temperatures, crunching under her boots as she paces her way through Ruby's spastic trail. Cold air claws the back of Weiss' throat as she calls out for the girl-- the only response being the faint echo of her own voice as it bounces off thick trunks of pine. Branches are weighed down with heavy powder, partially obstructing her vision of the path ahead, so her eyes mostly stay glued to the ground.

Despite her assumptions that Ruby can't have gone far in her current state, it's roughly 10 agonizing minutes before she finally catches up with the runaway. She finds her immediately, a red punctuation in a sea of white, collapsed at the base of a tree, shivering and unresponsive. 

"Ruby!" 

Weiss rushes to her side, dropping her bare knees to the snow and collecting her partner in her arms. Surprisingly, she's hot to the touch, but her clothing is soaked through. She runs her fingers through the younger girl's wet hair, pushing it out of her face and finding that the gauze covering her injury had fallen off at some point, exposing the mutilated, angry red scars that have since reopened and began bleeding. 

Without a second thought, Weiss tears off a sizeable shred of her own skirt and wraps it tightly around Ruby's head in a makeshift eyepatch. 

Upper body strength is not her forte, but the determination in getting Ruby back to safety, in tandem with the adrenaline of the chase eclipses her weakness. Awkwardly, Weiss manages to lift her up, carrying her over her shoulder. A cold sweat clings to her skin, her breaths coming in short measure. She squints at the ground beneath her, looking through blindingly white snow for the prints that lead her here.

It'll be a long trek back.


	2. 3am

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bruh moment. again, sorry for typos/errors heehee

With the last of her energy, Weiss all but drops her incapacitated partner onto the bed. Sweat forms and beads around her forehead and temples; her throat hoarse from the laborious breathing that came with carrying deadweight uphill-- through the snow. Despite her appearance, Ruby is _not_ as light as a feather. And Weiss will be the first to admit she lacks the constitution for heavy lifting.

She collapses onto the bed next to Ruby, catching her breath and allowing her eyes to adjust from the strain of snow blindness. The sound of Ruby's shallow breathing soothes her nerves-- relieved that she is relatively unharmed from running practically naked in frigid temperatures. 

However, the meager clothing Ruby _is_ wearing has been soaked through; which means they will have to come off-- the girl doesn’t need hypothermia on top of being monocular. 

Weiss isn't a stranger to dressing her partner. She'd done it a few times when Ruby was still in the hospital, and once since arriving at the vacation home. It's not a task she particularly has an issue with-- she _does_ care for her after all. 

But ever since Ruby's rejection at the ball, she has felt the crushing burden of guilt. Guilt when her gaze lingers just a little too long on the smoothness of Ruby's skin, or the toned muscles of her arms, or on the soft curves of her breasts. Guilt that compounds on the grief she already feels from not being able to protect her partner when it really counted.

She broke that promise. 

_"Just know, that I'm going to be the best teammate you will ever have."_

A significant failure on her part. One she may never fully come to terms with, nor be able to forgive.

With a huff, Weiss gathers herself, shelving her feelings yet again. There's no time for self-pity when you’re caring for someone else. She climbs on top of Ruby, essentially straddling her waist and pulling her up into a sitting position with her head against Weiss' chest. It's awkward, but efficient. She peels off the thin sienna tank top from her body with little effort and tosses it behind her, wet fabric slapping against the cold bedroom tiles. 

She allows Ruby to lie back down, clicking her tongue when she notices that the makeshift eyepatch torn from Weiss' own clothing is already stained with blood; and that some of it managed to transfer onto her bolero. 

Her eyes wander to the girl beneath her; absolutely out of it and shivering fiercely. Weiss peels a glove from her hand and presses it to Ruby's forehead, noting a slight fever. _Fantastic._

Sliding off of her partner, Weiss makes sure to avert her eyes as she peels her shorts and underwear off, throwing it in the same direction as the discarded shirt. 

Undressing her is the easy part. Putting clothes on an unconscious person is its own brand of hell. And for a moment, Weiss considers just wrapping her up in several blankets, setting her in front of the fireplace and calling it a day.

But that would certainly make for an awkward conversation when she inevitably wakes up. She puts a pin in the idea and reaches into one of Ruby's bags, pulling out a black thermal sweater and a red pair of bottoms. She recalls when Ruby bought these soon after landing in Atlas. The academy supplied the team with standard uniform PJ's, but after a few nights of enduring the Atlas chill, she insisted on buying warmer sleepwear.

After several minutes of exhaustively wrangling the clothing onto Ruby, the eyepatch definitely needs to be replaced. The fabric now soaked with cold sweat and blood. The hospital provided several disposable gauze-type eyepatches, though Weiss herself bought a permanent one in town for whenever the scars are settled-- a plain black one with Ruby’s emblem faintly printed on. 

Using a cloth with disinfectant, Weiss gently dabs away at the blood that steadily creeps from the claw marks. Ruby skin twitches in reply. The sight of the girl’s scars threaten to bring up memories-- still fresh in her mind, though vigilantly resisted. 

Weiss shies away from looking at it too closely; placing a new eyepatch over it, though the scars still peek out from underneath. Jagged down the top of her cheekbone. 

She wishes for a moment-- if only she could kiss it better. Like in fairy tales, where love cures all.

. . .

The rest of the day is spent lounging around the house. Watching the news intermittently, but ultimately succumbing to the temptations of mind-numbing made-for-TV movies. Anything to keep her thoughts from wandering. Cleaning Myrtenaster comes in between-- though she’s done this several times already over the past few days. 

She’s bored, yet too nervous to fully appreciate it. Directionless and unsure of what to do with herself; a feeling she is dreadfully familiar with from when she was brought back to the Schnee manor after the fall of Beacon. Isolation accompanied with a painful listlessness that contorts time, making days seem like weeks. She wishes Ruby were awake. At least then she’d have someone to talk to. 

Whether or not Weiss is ready to talk to Ruby about more serious matters is yet to be determined. 

In a sudden ambition to be mobular, Weiss throws on her winter gear and heads out to gather firewood. They have plenty, but she just needs something to do. The movie on TV was starting to get dangerously close to a romantic scene, and she simply cannot bring herself to sit through it. 

-

Though Myrtenaster was never made for chopping wood, it gets the job done. She’d found a strath nearby, where the pine was dry enough to salvage and the landscape was open enough to spot any Grimm. On occasion she’ll see a pack of them wandering-- but as Oobleck explained relentlessly through his many classes, the risk of them attacking was low in situations like theirs-- just two people in the middle of nowhere. No negativity. Or at least not enough to draw them in. 

Eventually, when her sled is full of an obscene amount of pine, Weiss observes a lone Sabyr Grimm amidst the treeline, skulking low and wandering aimlessly. It’s in these moments, she thinks she can appreciate the beasts-- the Grimm. 

Fighting them is one thing, but observing them outside of the intensity of battle is, in a sense, edifying. It’s proof that when there isn’t an opportunity to kill, they grow listess. They were born into this world with a purpose. And when that purpose is out of sight or unattainable, they merely exist as husks. Hollow.

Weiss can relate to that, or so she believes as she wipes pine sap from Myrtenaster and settles it on her hip. She then grabs the leads on the sled, moving to make the short trek back up to the house.

For so long she'd wanted to be a huntress. To establish her own identity. Reclaim Schnee Dust Company from her tyrannical father and make amends with the faunus. All those goals were eclipsed months ago by a more pressing and dire situation.

_Defeating Salem._

The journey was never easy-- and she was fine with that. But with the one simple fact of Salem being unbeatable, the journey seems pointless. Like carrying a pregnancy to full-term despite knowing the baby is already dead. 

Ruby has continued to be a cornerstone in Weiss' mind. No longer are they on this mission to win-- because in reality, they know the likelihood of that is obviously out of reach. 

No, they are doing this merely because it's the right and just thing to do. To _try_. 

Though with the recent events, Weiss wonders if her partner will lose herself. If this will be the tipping point that the team dreaded and feared. If Ruby will lose the will to go on. It seems unthinkable. Yet, with each obstacle they face and the constant resistance they've been met with along the way, even the most positive person would have to experience some level of anxiety-- of doubt. 

Weiss noticed the changes in her partner, over time. The senseless optimism that Ruby carried around with her in their days at beacon has slowly started to diminish, being replaced with a sobering level-headedness that Weiss both appreciates and is saddened by. Arriving in Atlas just made everything so much harder. For everyone.

She sighs, watching her breath cloud and vanish in the cold air. Carefully, she pulls the sled over a small frozen creek, admiring the smoothness of the ice beneath her feet. 

When Ruby wakes up, Weiss knows it will fall to her alone to build their leader back up. Get her back into shape both mentally and physically. It'll be difficult- there is no denying that. 

But for Ruby, she'd do anything.

. . .

Pain. The right side of her face is nothing but hot agony, pulsating to the rhythm of her heart beat, spreading to the back of her head and down her neck. She's dehydrated; lips chapped and throat dry. The taste of copper and decay lingers in the back of her mouth from the days of being incapacitated. 

With a soft groan, Ruby opens her eye to an icy gray ceiling, glowing faintly from the gentle rays of moonlight coming in through the only window in the room. It's obviously late into the night.

She follows a singular stream of light to a pair of curtains, slightly drawn. They're deep navy blue, or at least she thinks they are. Everything is dark, and her vision blurs in and out- her one good eye straining uncomfortably, as it attempts to compensate for the one she lost. 

In the moonlight, she can faintly make out the silhouette of an evident bedmate- her partner. 

_Weiss._

She swallows hard, her dry throat constricting painfully. When Ruby forces herself to sit up, it is then that she notices a restraint of some kind on her left wrist, essentially tethering her to the bed frame. She gives it a weak tug, finding it strongly secured.

Too exhausted to question her detainment, Ruby looks to Weiss, watching her sleep. 

Her white hair shimmers with an ethereal light in the moon's castoff, making her appear almost untouchable and otherworldly. Despite being asleep, Weiss looks troubled and uneasy; a faint crease in her brow and a slight frown. 

Without thinking, she reaches out, brushing a stray hair out of the older girl's face. At the slightest touch, Weiss lets out a soft groan and tilts her head to the side- it stirs something within Ruby, something foreign, yet instinctual. A reinforced urge to be closer. For a moment, she recalls their conversation at the Atlas Ball. How Weiss openly and plainly confessed her feelings. And how Ruby essentially shut down the conversation. Rejected her. Nervous, and confused. Scared. Shocked, really. 

Though her response was made in a moment of panic, she now wishes she would have handled it better; more honestly.

Then she thinks forward, to their battle with Cinder. How out of sync they were. How disastrous it ended. How they both let each other down.

Ruby pulls her hand away from her partner and turns it on herself, lifting the eyepatch and running her fingertips over the wreckage of where her eye once was. She wants to cry, but the tears won't come. A pit of anxiety has made its home in her chest, an unwelcome creature born from her near-death experience.

"You're awake."

Ruby turns back to her teammate, finding her propped up on her elbows and carrying the same worried expression from her dreams. 

"Yeah." Ruby murmurs.

They sit in silence, save for the space heater in the corner of the room offering mechanical white noise. Neither of them are sure of the other's demeanor. It's uncomfortable and tense, but also a relief on Weiss' part. Ruby is conscious, and this time she's not trying to make a run for it. 

"Do you need anything..?"

If Ruby weren't making an actual effort to focus, the question would have gone unacknowledged with how quiet Weiss spoke. The brunette doesn't have to think twice about her answer.

"Water." She replies, her voice hoarse. "But I can get it myself… if you get this" she pulls on the restraint again. "Off of me."

Weiss grouses through exhaustion. "Sorry, I forgot about that."

"Right… and what is it for?"

"To prevent you from pulling any more stunts." 

Ruby draws a blank, trying and failing to connect the dots. "Stunts?"

"You don't… remember?" Weiss blinks tiredly, running her fingers through white tresses that somehow remained pristine and undisturbed in her sleep. 

"Remember what?" She presses, watching the other girl slide out from under the blankets. Ruby observes as she walks around the bed to her side, kneeling down to unravel the elaborate knot tied around her wrist. 

She notes Weiss' sleepwear, a silk blue-gray nightgown that loosely adheres to her form in all the right ways. Realizing she's staring, Ruby reluctantly peels her eye away and flicks on the bedside lamp.

Weiss hesitates at her answer, staring at the cold tile floor. "You woke up earlier, but you… tried running away."

"Running away?" Ruby echoes. 

"Yes." The ex-heiress affirms. "You ran outside and into the woods, wearing practically nothing. I had to chase after you, but as usual you were faster than me. Eventually, I found you. Passed out under a tree and shivering. How can you not remember something like that?"

When the knot is undone, Ruby flexes her wrist back and forth to alleviate the stiffness and rubs at the indentations in her skin. "I don't know…"

Weiss then deposits the scarf, which Ruby now recognizes as the red one Weiss used to wear, into the bedside table. The question comes out before Ruby can stop herself. 

"So uh… you tied me up."

Weiss irks visibly, setting her jaw. "I wasn't thinking straight! It was the first thing that came to mind and the locks to the bedroom are on the inside. I wasn't about to barricade you in here like some prisoner."

Ruby looks down to her lap at the bedspread. A thick navy-blue duvet that matches the curtains. "Where even is here?"

Weiss, relieved that Ruby wasn't going to press further on the subject, gladly moves on. "Well, I guess you could call it a vacation house. Though my family stopped coming here pretty soon after I turned 10. It's just outside of Atlas, in the Boreas mountains. I thought it'd be in our best interest not to stay in the hospital. And I didn't want to stay where we could be easily recognized, like a hotel."

Ruby's brow becomes rigid, bringing herself to look at Weiss. "And… where is everyone else?"

Weiss averts her eyes and doesn't answer immediately, knowing her partner won't take the news well. 

The younger girl insists with a frown. "Weiss."

Clicking her tongue, Weiss rises from the floor and takes a seat at the edge of the bed. "They're probably two days out from Vacuo by now. They'll be meeting with Shade Academy's headmaster and securing the next maiden. They said that once you're rehabilitated, we can regroup in Sumire to collect the final Relic."

Frustrated, Ruby kicks the covers off of her and tears the eyepatch away, discarding it on the floor. 

"I don't need to rest. I need to be with them, helping!" She groans, massaging away at the sudden flare of tension in her skull.

Weiss, at a loss for words and tired, stays quiet. She watches her partner closely, noting the trembling that still haunts her hands, the exhaustion written on her face despite sleeping nearly four days. And the smallest tears forming in the corner of her eye. She desperately wants to embrace Ruby. To show her love and comfort her. But, the tension between them that's been building since they arrived in Atlas keeps her at bay. 

_"I don't think about stuff like that. Not when we're in the middle of a war…"_

Weiss chews the inside of her cheek, holding back the dozens of things she wants to say. It's too soon to unload her insecurities. They're both too fragile. 

Wordlessly, Ruby makes to stand up, though is swiftly apprehended by vertigo. She stumbles and loses her balance. Weiss jumps forward to hold Ruby steady, reassuring her with hands on her back and waist. 

"Careful…" Weiss soothes, feeling the heat radiating from her partner. 

Ruby moans through nausea, holding her head in an open palm. "I'm so thirsty."

"You should lie back down. I can get it for you." 

"No… no, I want to walk." Ruby insists through slight irritation. The tone doesn't go unnoticed by her partner, and it stings. Weiss knows the reason for her mood is that she's frustrated by her weakness, and being left behind. And probably some residual discomfort from the events before the battle.

Ruby exhales slowly, her vision swimming and her skin burning where Weiss touches her. 

Weiss, feeling the younger girl tensing at the contact, lets go and watches as she leaves the room, following soon after.

When she enters the living room, she witnesses Ruby, drinking directly from the kitchen faucet. She cringes at this. 

"There's bottled water in the fridge." Weiss remarks. Ruby straightens up, wiping stray water from her chin and acknowledging her partner's suggestion by grabbing a bottle instead.

"How long have I been out?" She breathes, struggling to twist the cap off.

".. About four days." Weiss admits. She moves closer, wordlessly taking the bottle away and removing the cap for her before handing it back. 

There's a glint of bitterness at the gesture, but she accepts. 

"Yet I'm still so tired."

She chugs down the water, desperate. Weiss watches through the corner of her eye as Ruby's throat flexes and contracts greedily for sweet hydration. Small streams of water cascade from the corners of her mouth and down her neck and chest as her grasp tightens around the bottle. The sight of this rouses a different kind of thirst in Weiss, and she forces herself to look away, ashamed.

Thinking of Ruby's injury, Weiss turns to the cabinet next to the fridge, opening it to retrieve a bottle of pain relievers that the hospital prescribed. Ruby's name is printed on it, along with the recommended dosage of two capsules. 

"Are you in pain?" The question fumbles out of Weiss' mouth despite knowing how dumb it sounds. 

Ruby's eye observes the bottle in her partner's hand, mentally evaluating her own pain. She eventually nods, stepping closer and holding out her hand.

Weiss drops 2 tablets into the girl's palm, who promptly knocks them back and swallows without issue. 

Silence creeps back in between them. Weiss tries her best not to look too intently at her partner's injury- fearful of upsetting the girl further. She ultimately fails at this.

Ruby brings up a hand, tracing her pale fingertips over the deep gashes clawed into where her eye once was. It lasts for only a second, but Weiss can see the resolute sadness resting on her brow-- a moment where she lets go of the anger.

"How bad is it?"

For this, the ex-heiress is at a loss. She knows Ruby appreciates blunt honesty over a soft delivery watered down with blind optimism. She knows this all too well, but it doesn't make the delivery any easier. 

"It'll leave a pretty sizable scar." She sighs. More than anything she wants to reach for Ruby's hand. "Your aura was completely drained, and it wasn't replenishing fast enough when you were in the hospital. There was little that could be done."

"Figures." Ruby nods solemnly, shivering slightly. The bedroom may be warm, but it's been difficult to get the rest of the house any warmer. The heating system hasn't exactly been well-used over the years.

"They think that your slow recovery has something to do with your silver eyes. But it was just speculation from the doctors. Something about losing a fraction of your power and how it might have shocked the rest of your system. But it's hard to say really…" 

"I do feel… like something is off." She admits through a frown directed at the floor. "I feel so weak."

"I know. And it'll take a while before you're…" she hesitates with her choice of words, knowing its tactless to say _'back to normal'_. "Back in fighting shape."

Ruby doesn't reply to this, instead turning her attention back to what's left of her water.

After finishing, she tosses the empty bottle at the trash can several feet away. It misses and clatters on the kitchen tiles. Ruby grimaces, knowing that her new vision impairment will likely have an effect on her signature sharp-shooting ability. 

She looks to Weiss, noting the unease hanging on her features. Despite the unspoken tension, she still cares for her partner.

"Are you uh, okay?" She asks. Her voice is hoarse, but genuine.

"Yes." She replies almost too quickly. "I'm fine. Just really tired."

Ruby knows better. _"Weiss."_

The older girl exhales slowly through her nose, keeping herself from looking directly at her one source of guilt. Without a word, she leaves the kitchen, heading back to the bedroom.

The footsteps that follow her only serve to fray her nerves. When she's back in bed, she considers going upstairs to the other bedroom. Give some space and solitude to her weakened and war-torn partner. And herself.

When the other side of the bed sinks down, a great rush of heat clings to the back of her neck and cheeks. How badly she wants to turn around, grab Ruby by the hair and kiss her. Of course, any thought of giving the girl affection is immediately trailed by shame and humiliation.

Weiss is mad about something; Ruby knows this. Maybe not mad, per se, but upset. 

Ruby is upset, too. 

Deciding to leave the older girl alone, Ruby lies down on top of the blankets, feeling overheated all of the sudden. When she flicks the bedside lamp off, a fresh wave of anxiety sinks in.

Her eye socket aches harder, pain ricocheting around the inside of her skull like a stray bullet. A small groan boils in the back of her throat. 

Closing her eye brings visions of Cinder, holding the gory clump of muscle that she’d effortlessly ripped from Ruby’s head. The matter of seconds in which she made it disappear in a controlled, calculated blaze of fire. Cremated from existence. The sensation of her Grimm hand plucking it out like it was nothing fuels a phantom pain like nothing else. 

She cringes into the pillow, trying to forget.

Hot tears form in her eye, something not produced by sadness-- but of residual fear. 

Fear rooted in the past, at how weak and small she was at Beacon, and at Haven, at Argus, in Atlas. Against Cinder.

Fear in the present, in worrying about the others' and their mission to get the relic. What if something goes wrong and she's not there to protect them?

And fear of the future-- of never getting back into fighting condition. Her chances of ever perfecting her silver eyes technique had been quashed. Burned away forever.

She feels useless. Wretched and insignificant. All she has is her speed, and even that might be compromised without binocular vision. All because of one missing body part.

The question of ' _what if I'm useless, now?_ ' Echoes through her consciousness, crescendoing louder and louder until she can no longer fight back the quiet sobs that leak onto the pillow.

Weiss notices the soft sounds of her partner's lament immediately. The mattress sinks as she shimmies closer. She places a cold hand over Ruby's shoulder, startling her between shaky breaths. 

A silver eye opens, tears falling freely as they meet with cerulean. 

Looking at Weiss' scar, Ruby suddenly feels a pang of jealousy; wishing that her injury could have been as superficial as all that. She could live with a mirrored scar-- they would be a matched set. 

She shifts onto her back, the pain rolling with her. Weiss carefully wipes the tears away with her thumb, caressing the other girl's face while appreciating the closeness and intimacy of her own actions. 

Ruby has been holding back, Weiss knows this. The young leader always keeping a cool head in the heat of battle, and during emotionally charged situations. Always calculating and recalculating. She's matured beyond her years from witnessing death and operating in the thick of an impossible war first hand. 

But at the end of the day, Weiss levels, Ruby is still just a girl. They both are. 

Without much thought, she leans down, planting a soft kiss on her forehead, and another over the inflamed scorch marks where her eye used to be. 

Weiss pulls back slightly, worrying that she went too far. If this gesture was _too_ intimate. Something that might be construed as beyond a friendly gesture. Which if she were being honest with herself, it was.

Ruby has, at the least, stopped crying.

She doesn't know if the lidded, unfocused look in her eye is one of desire, spite, or fatigue. She would, of course, hope it's the first one. 

Weiss swallows the lump in her throat, grappling with the severity in how badly she wants to keep going-- to keep kissing Ruby. 

She allows herself another. In a split second, she surrenders to her impulses; brushing her lips along the warmth of the other girl's cheek where a tear left its trail. 

It's wrong, and she knows it. Ruby is vulnerable and sensitive. She needs a friend, not a desperate and feeble attempt to kindle anything beyond that. 

But there's something in the way her leader tilts her head closer that begs to differ. 

Ultimately, Weiss is pulled away by her own nerves, making an effort to essentially play off the whole thing like it was no big deal. But it definitely was, and they both know it.

She reaches behind her and grabs the box of tissues on the nightstand, offering it to her partner who is still processing their small moment of intimacy. Ruby takes a tissue and pads away at the stray tears, only offering a faint 'thanks'. 

"Ruby?" 

"Hm?" 

Weiss bites her lip, contemplative of her options. 

"Do you want to talk about… what happened?" She takes a chance-- it's not like she risks anything by asking. 

She gathers the strength to look at her partner for a reaction-- for anything. But her gaze is not met; Ruby only stares down at her lap, twisting the used tissue between her fingers. She is silent for a moment. And in that moment, Weiss can already tell what the answer will be. 

"No, I don't-- I don't think so. Not right now."

_Figured as much._

"Do you want to be left alone? There's another bedroom upstairs that I can-"

"No, no.” She objects quickly, looking to Weiss. “I don't want to be alone.” 

There’s a watery desperacy in the back of Ruby’s throat that leaks into her words-- and Weiss acknowledges it. She can't help but feel a sense of relief by it. An affirmation that she can still do good by her partner. Still be useful.

“Okay, I’ll stay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks 4 reading ilu


End file.
